In Nehemiah we see one who had a deep and constant sense of the ruined state of God’s people; but he was content to be among that little remnant that had returned to Jerusalem and share their sorrows and reproach rather than to settle down amid the ease and luxuries of the palace of the king of Persia.
Surely if we would enter into the feelings of Christ our affections would go out to all His people; for “Christ also loved the church, and gave Himself for it” (Eph. 5:25), and though all be divided and in ruins, still it is the object of His care even now. He is sanctifying and cleansing it with the washing of water by the Word, and one day He is going to present it to Himself the Church glorious, not having spot or wrinkle, or any such thing. (Eph. 5:27).
Nehemiah confessed that they had dealt very corruptly against the Lord, and had not kept the law as it had been given to them by His servant Moses. He refers to what Moses had foretold, how that on account of their disobedience they would be scattered abroad among the nations. But he also pleads the Lord’s promise through Moses that if they turned to Him, He would gather them back to that place where He had chosen to set His name. Then he sets Israel, sinners though they were, before God on the ground of redemption, and reminds Him of His purposes of grace toward them. At the close he desires that his prayer and the prayers of others might be heard, and that he might be granted favor in the sight of “this man” — the king. Nehemiah understood well the position that he and his people were in being subjected to Gentile authority, yet before God, who is no respecter of persons (Acts 10:34), and who ruleth in the kingdoms of men (Dan. 4:25), the head of the most powerful kingdom in the world was but a man. “The king’s heart is in the hand of the Lord, as the rivers of water: He turneth it whithersoever He will.” Prov. 21:1.
It was in the month Chisleu (our November), of the year B.C. 456 that this report had reached Nehemiah, and chapter 2 opens with his appearing before the king in the month Nisan (our March), in the year B.C. 455. His grief of heart during those four months over the condition of Jerusalem showed out in Nehemiah’s countenance. The king noticed at once that he was sad and demanded to know the reason for it, adding, “This is nothing else than sorrow of heart.” Then Nehemiah tells us how afraid he was. We suppose the reason for his fear was that the king might think his servant was plotting against, him and had a bad conscience. He might have ordered him to immediate execusion, not an uncommon thing for a despot to do in those times. However, sustained of the Lord, Nehemiah replied, “Let the king live forever,” thus assuring his royal master that his servent had the best wishes for his life.
He then tells him the simple truth: “Why should not my countenance be sad, when the city, the place of my fathers’ sepulchres, lieth waste, and the gates thereof are consumed with fire?” Well might a godly man be sad as he thought of what God had been to His people, what they had once been to Him, and what they were now. Still he had confidence in God, but he felt the ruin that had come in.
ML 06/07/1959